GUEST CRITIC: THE ICE BERG
Entering the movie theater knowing only Seth Rogan, a product of producer/director Judd Apatow and Mr. Apatow's movies such as "The 40 Year Virgin" and "Knocked Up", was starring in the film, I was expecting a comedy that was going to be light-hearted and good-natured, filled with some raunchy, silly humor. The plot for these movies usually is about a lonely protagonist (He has his bros/male friends though!!) who is oblivious to certain immature aspects in his life, but by the end of the picture, he eventually grows up, gets the way hotter female love interest in the process, and lives happily ever after. However, after watching "Observe and Report", I was pleasantly surprised that this was actually an unyielding dark comedy with an unrelenting, demented portrayal of a character who wants nothing more than to serve and protect the people of a typical American mall.
The movie takes the premise of a typical mall cop named Ronnie Barnhart (Seth Rogan) who gets to be something more than just observing and reporting petty, adolescent, mall loiterers and angry, unruly customers when a flasher wreaks havoc on his beloved mall. In order to catch the menace and also gain the affection of his dream girl Brandi (Anna Faris), he escalates a rivalry between him and a hard-nosed detective (Ray Liotta).
Seth Rogan does not take his foot off the petal in playing this deranged character from the start of the movie to finish. He straddles the line of being the 'Cool Everyman' and something that is more maniacal and perplexing. Rogan nails the troubled character pretty convincingly all the while still being very funny throughout the movie due to the the help of great comedic writing from writer/director Jody Hill. Hill turns the archetype of the mall cop upside down from the stereotypical harmless, unimportant loser and made him into a very self-delusional, serious character. It was definitely interesting to watch.
And since this film is a dark comedy, it gets pretty serious during the last third of the movie with dark themes such as Ronnie Barnhart getting into some serious moments of rage, violence, and drug use. These moments were sometimes kind of played off in a comedic way, but they were still a little sad and strange.
Despite these sudden, weighty scenes, the movie is pretty hilarious in the beginning and pretty much throughout the film such as the scene when Ronnie gets dropped off by Detective Harrison in a rough part of town as well as the surprising mall ending.
The supporting characters did a terrific job in stealing every scene in the movie. They were all somewhat one dimensional and I didn't care for some of them (The Toast-a-Bun barista girl). However, most of the cast truly helped enhance the movie, particularly the so-called "Special Elite Task Force." This task force includes Dennis (Michael Pena), Ronnie's sidekick (Everything he said was hilarious!) and the twin gun wielding security guards, John and Matt Yuan. These three played off Rogan's comedic chops extremely well. Anna Faris does a perfect job playing a mean, blonde party girl. Anyone who routinely goes to bars or clubs knows a girl just like that. Even Ronnie Barnhardt's mother (Celia Weston)
had some great comedic moments as Ronnie's drunken parent.
A minor qualm I had with the movie is the profanity throughout this movie in order to make dialogue funny; this seem forced sometimes. Other times, it was rather hysterical especially the scene with the actor Aziz Ansari who plays Saddamn (yes, racial undertones, but who cares this time).
In the end, the movie has plenty of silly, raunchy comedy with a tad of male nudity to get the audience through those serious and dark parts of the movie.
